“We could mount one in each bow of the captured boats,” Lewrie sketched out. “Mount the captured two- pounder swivels on either beam, perhaps put ten Marines in each as well, and we’d have decent-sized gunboats that could go up the rivers further than our sloops. Do we find a reason, we could put together a whole flotilla of armed boats, and get at any privateers, or supply vessels, no matter haw far up-river they’re anchored. Sail ’em as far as we can, fire the carronades just a few degrees either side of the forestays, then lower the masts and row ’em like they did galleys in the Mediterranean in the old days.”
“When we do, sir, I
“‘Who shall have this’un, then?’” Lt. Lovett bellowed, imitating the ritual of the lower deck. “Give it ol’ Westcott;
“Gentlemen, I give you Mister Geoffrey Westcott,” Lt. Darling quickly proposed, making Pettus and Jessop scramble to top up their glasses, “a fire-eater of the first order, ha ha!”
“‘For he’s a jolly good fellow, for he’s a jolly good fellow!’” Lovett sang out, and they tossed their fresh wines back to “heel-taps”.
“’Deed he is,” Lewrie said once the song was done, “And the very fellow to whip up some drawings of how the carronades are to be mounted on swivelling platforms. A dab-hand artist, I have found.”
“You draw, sir?” Lt. Bury asked, blinking in surprise. “You must show me your work.”
“Aye, I’m told by Captain Lewrie that he found your artwork a wonder, as well, Bury,” Westcott replied, “though I must own that it is rare that I attempt sketches in colour. More black-and-white are mine, with
“I should be delighted,” Bury responded quickly, glad to find a fellow who shared his artistic bent. The others at table shared a few secret amused looks, for they had already heard of Bury’s fishes, and the lengths he went to for accuracy in form and colouring.
“Beg pardon, sir,” Pettus asked at Lewrie’s shoulder. “Should I clear, and set out the port and bisquit?”
“Aye, Pettus, so long as ye don’t include the dog,” Lewrie told him with a snicker.
“Once the new gunboats are made suitable, sir,
“Yes, now you’re back with us, sir, we could use
“Gentlemen, I am delighted with all you’ve accomplished in my absence,” Lewrie told them. “
“Confusion to the Spanish!” Lt. Westcott proposed.
“Confusion to the King’s enemies!” Lovett proposed, next.
“Really, sir… you spent time among Red Indians?” Darling asked once the din had subsided from their vociferous shouts of agreement with the toasts’ sentiments. “Do the… Muskogee really practice cannibalism, as I heard?”
“Not cannibalism, no,” Lewrie said with a chuckle; “I saw no sign of that. No heaps of skulls, either, though there was the odd scalp hung up here and there, but even their principal war chief, a fellow by name of Man-Killer- truly!-of the White Clan, and one of the fearsomest fellows ever I did see… said that it was Whites who started scalping, so they could have proof of payment from the old royal governors. He was a senior war chief, though they didn’t make war all that often. After we got back to the coast and had our set-to with the Dons and their Indian allies, after I got accepted as
“Ehm… my word,” Lt. Bury said with a gulp.
“Man-Killer thought it a grand jape t’marry me to a Cherokee girl they’d captured on one of their raids, too,” Lewrie added, chuckling. “I had to pay him a good pistol for the privilege!”
“You
“Had to,” Lewrie told him, grinning. “She was ‘ankled’, and it was my doing. Think of a ‘sword-point’ wedding, with tomahawks.” He had not intended to, but, since there were no impressionable and innocent Midshipman at- table this evening, he elaborated on the story.
“Her name was Soft Rabbit. I don’t know t’this day if that was her Cherokee name, or one the Muskogee gave her, but it suited her,” he told them. “First time I saw her was at sundown, when we were bathing at the shore of a lake. Wore nothing but a breechclout, she did, the wee-est, loveliest young woman ever I clipped eyes on, with hair as black as a raven’s wing, and the biggest deer-doe eyes…”
Lt. Geoffrey Westcott, ever the ship’s Casanova, shifted about on his chair, making it squeak as if to ease himself, too taken by the image to top up his glass of port or pass the bottle larboardly to the next officer.
Lewrie had no fear that he would be deemed a maundering old bore, for once he began, everyone sat rapt.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
No matter Lewrie’s vow for further amphibious landings, he had to take the little squadron South, again, to peek round Cape Florida into Mayami Bay once more to assure himself that that grand anchorage was not being used. They probed round Cape Canaveral and into the Banana River, then each inlet they found on their way back North to re-commence the loose blockade of St. Augustine. In the main, they found nothing of value to loot or burn, and no sign of privateers from any nation.
After the first hour, with no sounds of combat coming from shore, and no tell-tale plumes of smoke from gunpowder discharges or burning huts, Lewrie gave up pacing the shore-side of the quarterdeck, and had his collapsible wood-and-canvas deck chair fetched up, along with his penny-whistle, for a good sit-down and a tootle or two. For a bit, he considered having the quarterdeck awnings rigged, for it was a hot day with light sea winds and a blistering mid-June sun.
Toulon and Chalky were spraddled out atop the cross-deck hammock nettings like sleeping leopards, and did not even open one slitted eye as he began to work his way through “The Rakes of Mallow.” He was into a second rendition when Bisquit began to howl from beneath the starboard ladderway. Lewrie stopped and the dog stopped. He started again, and Bisquit bayed and yipped like a lonely wolf’s keening. The watch-standers and the hands on deck found it highly amusing.
“We’ve a singing dog!” Midshipman Grainger hooted to his mates.
As many nights as possible during the Second Dog Watch, there was music and singing on deck, even some dancing of hornpipe competitions, to mellow the ship’s crew. That was what the posted notices had promised back
